


who i am and who i could be

by transvav



Category: Mianite (Minecraft Series), Minecraft (Video Game), Realm of Mianite - Fandom
Genre: Gen, Prodigal Son AU, Ruxomar, Season 2 AU, coming home time!, jordan is spark and ianite's son from ruxomar, jordan takes a rest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-03
Updated: 2020-07-03
Packaged: 2021-03-04 22:47:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,992
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25044133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/transvav/pseuds/transvav
Summary: they arrive in the realm of ruxomar. and jordan lies to himself.
Comments: 10
Kudos: 72





	who i am and who i could be

**Author's Note:**

> this is an au where jordan is the thirdborn son to ruxomar's ianite and spark, and he fell into the void when he was a teen, and was therefore separated from his family. and now he's back! enjoy!

jordan lies to himself.

it’s what he’s best at. convincing himself of things that simply aren’t right.

he starts this off the second they wake up from their landing in jail cells, and shuts any and all of his feelings down within a moment, and locks away any excessive magic, and tucks his ties to ianite so deep within his own heart he knows his visage changes, just a little. his eyes will be dark blue when he looks in the mirror next, and his hair will have lost it’s minor glow. he will look _human,_ as human as he ever has been. not that the others _noticed_. not that they ever could have.

but lying to himself about doesn’t change the fact that he isn’t.

and he can’t escape the truth that he’s back home again.

dagrun has shifted in ways he doesn’t entirely comprehend. the town was built years and years ago, long since past, but it has hit its peak and prime and seems, at least to him, to be thriving despite the night invaders. when they meet him, at the gate, the priest’s gaze, ever constant, never aging, flickers with recognition.

but jordan thins his lips and feigns innocence, praying silently to an empty heart that he goes unnoticed.

and sure enough, all he gets from declan is a heavy, tired sigh, a long standing regret woven into the breath, before he smiles, wide, and fake, and a sheer mask that is falling so easily off of his face, and the priest says _nothing_ of dianite, or ianite. his gaze is sharp when tom even mentions his god in a quick joke of a remark to tucker.

jordan bites his tongue, swallows the building sick, and reminds himself that it is not his problem. it can’t be his problem. why should it be.

(his hands shake as he pushes his glasses further up the bridge of his nose, gripping the‒ admittedly weak‒ iron sword a little tighter. he is so, so aware that even with his best efforts, he will not be able to keep his own mask and facade up for long. the second it gets to be too much, he will betray himself. and judging by the way the world works, now, he’ll be betraying her, too. his skin feels paler than usual, and he knows every part of him will be muted against ruxomar’s magic. as it needs to be. as he has to be.

godless in a strange new land, he lies.)

and lies, and lies, and lies through it all. seeing andor shakes him to his core, because how can the priest deny him so much of himself? the prince is young, barely his age, now, just shy of 21 himself. jordan’s stomach turns when they meet that day, because jordan was barely 12 when‒

andor’s wings are soft, and white, and to the untrained eye, they match those of an angel’s, of mianite’s quartz throne, of the clouds on a clear day, of purity and cleanliness and order. but jordan’s eyes are _masked_ , not untrained, and he knows better. he knows that in moonlight there will be color caught under the light, and each feather will reflect the power andor is waiting to hold without a fight, without a question. without _fear_. there is magic in andor like there was magic in jordan.

and jordan knows andor in a way he doesn’t think andor will ever know himself.

it gets harder, when helgrind comes around. jordan spends that night in the house they’d given him shaking under covers and fighting the tug and flow of his own magic and making him want to vomit. he loves him, he does, but he is different in ways jordan doesn’t understand, and it scares the hell out of him. he’s overheard the reasoning. he knows why‒

he wraps himself tighter and _shakes_ against the storm raging on the window panes, sheets of wind and water threatening to shatter the thin glass, threatening to drown him in his own thoughts. jordan’s magic is screaming like the hurricane airs in the trees, making his heart go haywire. ruxomar’s magic is different than the other realm, orderly and sharp and stinging, whereas the others had been‒ wild. unpredictable. and jordan has a mix of both, now, cutting into his circulation and taking the breath from his lungs.

where is she, where is she, where is she, _who is he._

who was he.

are they expecting him to come home? are they waiting for him? does he still hold a place in their heart and minds like he used to, or is he tucked away into his own little corner for each of them, something not forgotten, but just another haunting memory of someone that they cannot have back?

jordan blocks the world out of his thoughts and _works_ , and works, and works. he recognizes steve, older and tired and a liar, like him. in another time, jordan and steve would have been closer, could have been brothers. he knows the energy steve carries, knows dianite’s spirit, and bites his tongue when steve lies right back to him about his loyalty.

“would you die for your deity?” jordan asks the farmer, skirting around the clarification word, and steve blinks, and his mouth twists.

“ay,” steve eventually says. “reckon i would.”

jordan swallows thickly because his answer is the same. he would die for her, wouldn’t he? and she would hate that.

the day arrives when they all come upon a little house on a hill just far enough away from dagrun that it seems alone‒ not out of place, but not quite a part of the city itself. there are roses in the garden with overgrown thorns, lilies of the valley sprouting between the stepping stone and wooden plank path to the front door. it is overrun by plants, and there are ravens nesting in the roof’s support beams, a natural twilight portal having been open for quite some time somewhere in the yard nearby. it is old, and empty, but not abandoned, not entirely. not yet.

no one has lived in this house for many, many years.

the others seem to brush past it without issue‒ what can come of old ruins and broken windows? but jordan lingers. of course he lingers, and _lies_ that he’ll catch up later. says something about needing to heal up, and take a breath. and they let him, because why wouldn’t they. without question, why wouldn’t they.

the door hinges swing open without issue. ~~his father~~ whoever built the house had made them rust proof, enchantments engraved in the metal, silence runes on the floorboards to keep them from creaking underneath the kids’ feet. the place is built to be longstanding, long lasting.

meant to house four immortals, and one single mortal soul.

he tries not to think about how _fast_ his heart feels in comparison to before, how the realm’s old magic was untapped and wild and is pumping through his veins stronger than his own blood. his own _blood._

the floorboards, faithfully, do not creak beneath his feet. the kitchen is dusty and laid bare, a fruit basket on the counter, dishrags hanging over the wash basin, almost clean despite the layers of dust. freshly washed, however many years ago. the stove is empty, save for an old pan, warped with time’s cruel hand. there are cracks in the mugs on the cupboard shelves, one‒ the blue one, specifically‒ is completely cracked in half, a small purple growth in the ceramic shards. but only that one. the smallest mug, he notes, is a pale magenta purple, familiar and left on it’s own, sitting on the dining table in front of the smallest chair. waiting for someone that wouldn’t come home.

except.

he moves into the living room. the loveseats are pushed closely together, hand stitched throw pillows flattened and worn with care and time, left behind. like everything else in the house. not forgotten. just left behind. and he gets it, he does. the fireplace is empty, old coals and ash left behind at the bottom, the poker sitting in it’s stand. winds from the east. jordan begins to fix the glass in the windows, drawn to the clear cut panes, careful not to cut his own hand.

when he is finished, the storm has already begun. he takes the curtains and closes them against the shattering flashes of lightning against the horizon. the others clamour for his safety on the communicator, and jordan assures them of it, before signing off for the night. the connection will be dodgy in the storm anyways. thunder rumbles across the hills, and shakes him to his very core. far off the coast he knows the seas are rolling, raging, fighting the boats they hold, threatening the port town, and jordan can’t find it in himself to think too long about if they will be safe, too concerned with the icy waters pulling his own heart down first.

a door opens down the hall. jordan trails his fingers down the wall when he walks, drags his feet beneath him on the carpet, shoes and coat at the door, glasses abandoned on the table near the old mug.

the door that’s open leads to a child’s room, neat, and tidy, and heart wrenchingly familiar. the flowers on the windowsill are still alive, vines creeping beneath the barely open glass, curling across the windows, keeping the storm out, and the petals glow weakly, until he steps across the threshold. and then they _blind_ him.

the room comes to life before him, every single thing he was desperately trying to keep out surfacing and exploding outwards because‒ because‒

the floor beneath his feet has stains he made with cups of cocoa when it was snowing, spilled when he was too excited in the morning and the cocoa had long since gone cold and he’d knocked them all over in the rush to meet his mother in the kitchen after catching the smells of warm bread and pie and pancakes. there are old books on the shelves, cracked spines, scribbled runes in galactic, and each sprinkle of lapis leaves stains on his fingertips and sticks to the old wood, blue streaks in the grain‒ his _favorite_ books, he remembers, oil lanterns burned to the barest bones through the night in the deepest corner of his closet to keep his parents from catching him up so late. ink jars are open on the desk, a journal entry half finished‒ part in the morning, the rest at night, but he hadn’t come home to finish that night, had he?

there are figurines and little trinkets on the shelves, rocks he’d found interesting, remnants of magic items he’d been given from his brother’s old adventures when he’d come home, things his mother thought he’d like, things his father and jeriah had gifted him to help him learn. there are two bows on the wall‒ one so clearly meant for training, and nothing more. and he remembers that bow. remembers his father’s arms and hands over his, the smile in his voice, the care in his grip. he remembers the draw, the pull, the release, the _thwack_ of the fake arrow smacking against the wall‒

_(laughter, delight. warmth and pride. “our son’s a natural born archer!”)_

the second bow is one he never got to hold, but one his father had promised him for when he was older. he tears his gaze away and swallows tight, shivering at the draft and the flash of light peeking through the vines.

and then the bed, dusty and empty, pillows unfluffed, old stuffed animals propped against the wall, and they bring tears to his eyes‒ his sister had tried so hard to make him a little fox plush, once, and it had turned out lumpy and uneven, and he’d _loved_ it anyways. the soft fabric had soothed his nightmares, and the odd shape and firmness of how the cotton had been placed was just right to tuck against his chest next to his beating heart. eventually she’d made him a better one, but the first was always his favorite, besides, of course, the small, green plush cube of fleece and silk, with little button eyes and a hand stitched smile. the _first_ jerry, so carefully crafted before he was born.

with gentle touch, he picks it up gingerly, like it’s made of like. like he feels he is. he can feel old divots in the fabric from where smaller hands had carried it _everywhere_ , the familiar feeling of the fabric against his skin. it feels so tiny in his hands, now, so much different than what he remembers. jerry was everything, to him, a friend and companion and a safety net, a secret keeper and a promise holder. jordan swallows thickly, and almost sets jerry down‒ until he sees the quilt.

it’s handmade, stitched with careful fingers and steady needles, lovingly pieced together night by night. the pattern is nothing special, the design is easy to master, clear cut corners and long strips of fabric, but it isn’t what the design is. it isn’t about the color of the fabrics, purples and beige golds and dark greys and black. it isn’t about what it looks like at all. he brushes the dust from the cotton, and his breath hitches when it all blows away in an instant. the room is clean, every inch, but he barely notices.

jordan pulls it upwards, and presses his face into the quilt top and inhales. the scent knocks him to his knees.

this is his quilt. his blanket. his cape and his tent. something he’d twisted up and wrapped and pressed it into his chest with his fox and jerry, sniffled into when he couldn’t contain his tears, pressed himself into the corner of his closet with. this is _his quilt_ , to wrap around his shoulders when the rain was too much, to wake up laying beneath when he’d fallen asleep in the living room, to curl against when his fever was too high or his stomach was churning or his nose was stuffy and his throat was scratched up. it is warm when it’s cold out and cool when it’s hot out. the binding is worn and torn softly at the edges, some of the main corners are coming undone, and the fabric is much softer than it had been when it’d first been made, well loved, well worn. not forgotten, never forgotten. how could he forget, he could never, never‒

his mother had made this for him.

_ianite_ had sewn this together for him over nights and nights. had presented it to him by draping it over his shoulders after he’d nearly fallen asleep at her side. had helped him tie it around his neck like a cape, had helped him pack it for when they’d gone camping, had tucked him in to bed at night and pressed it tight against him to lock him down, like something would happen to him if she didn’t. and she’d left a kiss on his head, and kept the door cracked, the hall lantern still flickering steadily as it would through the whole night.

with every part of him, he lifts the covers on his bed and crawls beneath them, laying upon the soft pillow, and pulls his quilt to his nose again and breathes shakily. and when jordan hiccups his first silent sob, the world falls quiet around him.

he can’t lie to himself anymore, he knows. he can’t do it.

it shatters around him, that self-imposed peace and forced silence, and jordan _yells_ from his throat to his chest to his lungs to his heart, roars until his voice is raw, screams until he cannot breathe.

and when his voice is silent, the magic comes rushing in.

beneath his eyelids, the world is bright, bright, bright, lilac and lavender, royal and violet, and every part of him is alight in shades of purple. he can feel it over every inch of his skin like a livewire and it’s so warm, almost too warm, beneath every blanket and every memory, weighing him down further into the mattress, further and further, sinking into it all like a stone in the ocean, delving into the depths he’d been so desperately trying to stay afloat in. his mother’s connection to him hums to life like an engine as he lets that little bottle of everything shatter open again, and for the first time in _years_ , jordan feels like he can really truly _breathe_.

he sleeps. like a _child_ , he drifts into the safety of dreams, escapes the reality of his secrets being laid out upon the table for the world to see. the son of a god is not easily _missed_ , in the world, and before he falls into unconsciousness, he knows the realm can recognize his return. the world cheers, rejoices, calls to the living gods and the dead ones, everyone around, everyone awake. everyone who could want or need to know. rejoice, the skies sing, praise be, and celebrate.

the prodigal son is home.

* * *

when he wakes up in the morning, there is someone at his bedside, tears down her cheeks, disbelief in her entire being. her hand is shaking above his face, hesitant and unsure, but when their gazes meet, there is that blaze of magic, balanced again.

_“jordan...?”_ his sister says, hesitant and afraid, and he reaches up and takes her hand in his own.

“hi, mar,” he says, voice weak and fragile and brittle, and she sobs in relief, in terror, with emotion he can’t place, and pulls him close to her chest, rocking him close. “missed you.”

with any luck, jordan thinks, wrapped in that oh so familiar comfort of _family_ ‒

he’ll meet his mother again.

and maybe she’ll forgive him for being late for dinner.

**Author's Note:**

> my [tumblr](http://transvav.tumblr.com)  
> i got that stupid brain shit goin off baybee


End file.
